An 11-member panel of scientists, prosecutors and legal...

An 11-member panel of scientists, prosecutors and legal experts appointed on September 2003 (see) by Gov. Mitt Romney to help bring back capital punishment in Massachusetts, has proposed new legal and scientific safeguards. The council did not take a position on whether the state should reinstate the capital punishment. Instead, in a 29-page report, the council identified a series of safeguards designed to make the death penalty "as narrowly tailored and as infallible as humanly possible." It recommended adopting: * A narrowly defined list of murders eligible for the death penalty. * Stricter controls over prosecutorial conduct in capital-punishment cases. * A system to ensure defendants in capital cases are assigned qualified attorneys. * Trial procedures to allow convicted murderers to request new juries for the sentencing phase. * Special jury instructions about the shortcomings of human evidence, such as confessions and eyewitness accounts. * A requirement in the sentencing phase that "conclusive scientific evidence" be used to corroborate a defendant's guilt. * A heightened burden of proof in sentencing to enhance the accuracy of jury decision making. It would be a higher standard than "beyond a reasonable doubt" required for conviction. * Independent scientific review of collection, analysis and presentation of scientific evidence. * Broad authority for trial and appellate courts to set aside wrongful death sentences * The creation of a death penalty review commission to examine claims of errors. Massachusetts abolished capital punishment in 1984 and has not executed anyone since 1947 Many lawmakers have said support for capital punishment has steadily waned since 1997, when the Legislature came within one vote of legalizing the death penalty in 1997. In March 2001, for instance, the House defeated a death penalty bill by a vote of 94 to 60.